Patients are undergoing more minimally invasive procedures as alternatives to open surgical procedures. These less invasive procedures use a variety of devices which are placed in organs and tissues, or abdominal, pulmonary, urologic spaces with the goal of manipulating, cutting, capturing and/or stabilizing structures at a distance from the operator. Retrieval of samples of tissues, masses, or lymph nodes may be required for histopathologic diagnosis. In addition operative procedures may require the removal of tissue components to achieve the requisite surgical result.
Standard or direct explorations or excisions of device components or retained materials, can be overly invasive and traumatic, and inconsistent with the basic principles of minimizing direct trauma through minimally invasive procedures. Therefore, minimally invasive devices and techniques have been developed to retrieve samples of suspicious lesions, masses or objects from the body. In addition standard direct explorations to excise tissue specimens can also be overly invasive and traumatic and are preferably completed with minimally invasive procedures.
There are a number of shortcomings in the designs of conventional biopsy devices and their application in clinical practice which limits their effectiveness and/or simplicity. The success of the biopsy procedure depends on the ability of the sampling device to efficiently and reliably obtain the foreign material. Similarly, the success of a biopsy procedure depends on the ability of the biopsy device to efficiently and reliably capture a portion of tissue. The initial steps of a biopsy procedure require that the sampling device must come in contact with the foreign material in a way that allows the device to engage it.
The object of the present invention is to provide a device that overcomes these deficiencies and improves the biopsy procedure.
Other features and advantages of the present invention will be apparent from the following detailed description when read in conjunction with the accompanying drawings.